


It’s called moving on

by perpetualguilt



Category: Spies Are Forever - Talkfine/Tin Can Brothers
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, impromptu burial, mentions of blood and fatal injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-21
Updated: 2020-01-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 17:53:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22347499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perpetualguilt/pseuds/perpetualguilt
Summary: Real life doesn’t get a ‘fade-to-black’ moment, and Curt must now deal with the weight of his decision.Takes place immediately following Owen’s death.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 21





	It’s called moving on

  
No one forgets what it’s like to kill someone. You get desensitized to it after a certain amount of bodies, of course, especially in Curt’s line of work. You learn to find ways to justify your actions, convince yourself it was necessary, forgive the blood on your hands, or just drink yourself into a blissful stupor. But you never forget. Even when it’s been four years since you held a gun in your hand, brandishing it at the enemy as you stare down the barrel of his own piece brandished right back at you. Feeling the ice in his gaze and the daggers in his words sting you to the very core, the act a cruel marriage between calculation and scarred, unresolved feelings cracking themselves wide open all over again. Owen was practically daring him to do it again. He’d dragged the corpse of his memory out from Curt’s brain, robbed it of any good or solace it had brought Curt in his most awful hours, and then set fire to the tombstone for the fun of it. 

Curt remembered thinking: it just takes one shot to finally end this. For good, this time. One shot to save the world, if he took it, or to potentially doom the world if Owen did. Not that Curt didn’t have the utmost faith in the agents that will eventually succeed him... but, well, in his haste to track down and corner Owen, he’d sort of forgotten to mention the existence of Chimera’s little scheme to anyone over at the American Secret Service. _Whoops_. That’s Tatiana’s game anyhow, one he completely trusted her to win or else he wouldn’t be here right now- ‘here’ being halfway up a cold, dank stairway waiting to either kill or be killed- living a moment he has lived many, many times, yet for all his experience he’s finding it difficult to do what needs to be done. He couldn’t believe that his _only_ option was to pull the trigger.

Though he struggled to think or speak through the cloud of betrayal billowing around both of them, Curt really tried to choose differently. He pleaded and reasoned as best he could, but the thing is: Owen Carvour was already dead. Curt had known that much already, electing to bury it deep down somewhere. Staring into this ghost’s cold, dead eyes, he realized that it was still true. But what if...? _What if?_ What if _what?_ He clenched his jaw, shoved aside his personal feelings; this was not about them anymore. This Owen- the **deadliest** man alive, he had to remind himself- posed an all too real threat to the safety of people everywhere. Maybe he would never be able to forgive himself for killing Owen the first time, given that the method and the reason were entirely senseless. Accidental. But this time? This time Curt could convince himself to kill someone who was already dead and hellbent on taking others down with him.

Owen’s corpse hit the steps with a horrible, meaty thump as blood poured from his temple, like so many memories scattering in every direction to their freedom. Curt had ended up taking two shots, in the end. Or perhaps disarming shots don’t count? It hardly made any difference. His professional resolve instantly shattered and, for a while, the only thing he could do was stand there with his gun in his hand and the gruesome scene burning into his vision. He’d done what needed to be done.

...right?

 **No.** Shove those feelings back where they belong. Justify. Convince. Forgive. Drink? He’ll cross that bridge when he finds it (the nearest bar, that is). He still had a mission to complete first.

Curt stowed away his gun and purposefully approached the body to check every pocket and look for secrets in the typical places one would hide a secret upon their person. Jacket collar, cufflink, shoe soles, etc. Owen had always been a careful spy, but it only takes another spy to know a spy’s sly tricks. Even truer for spies as well acquainted as they had been, once. Regardless, he didn’t find much: a communication device (which he crushed underfoot), two large tactical knives and other assorted ‘instruments’, a pack of chewing gum, a comb, some money, that kind of stuff. Nothing like a clue or a document that could serve as evidence. Curt found himself a bit impressed by Owen’s discretion and simultaneously frustrated by his apparent foresight. But then, he supposed, you don’t goad someone into chasing you across countries without being utterly confident that he will never get what he’s after, even if he wins.

And he did. Win. He killed the bad guy; he saved the day. Curt Mega had _won_. How insultingly untrue. Owen’s cold, dead eyes looked towards the ceiling at nothing in particular, would never look at anything again. Not even a hint of the anger that had apparently been fueling him remained. Curt would’ve rather suffered Owen’s empty wrath a hundred times over, he thought (but tried not to), preferring that to this genuine emptiness. What had Curt gained from any of this game of cat and mouse? _What_ had he won, besides an even greater, even more elusive enemy to contend with? What did Owen’s death actually accomplish?

 **Stop.** This was neither the time nor place; he needed to focus on getting out of here. He hovered over the body a moment longer to brush Owen’s eyes shut and then leapt over him to the top of the stairway. He’d have to do this as quickly and quietly as possible. Owen’s wound had begun to clot but still had the potential to make a mess if moved around too much. So Curt took off and used his own jacket to prevent blood from getting absolutely everywhere as he carefully dragged Owen up off of the ground and heaved him half over his shoulder. Owen was taller than Curt ( _damn him_ ) and thus ended up being rather awkward to handle, but there was no way in hell Curt was gonna leave him here like just another job well done. Owen deserved-

He...

He’d deserved better. So much better than what he got. And, if nothing else, the one thing he deserved that wasn’t too little too late for Curt to give him was a better place to rot than on the concrete of a Russian facility.

Curt stole one of the unattended military vehicles parked out and around the side of the facility, depositing Owen onto the back seat and hoping as he hotwired the engine that the thing had enough gas to get him somewhere. An actual town would be nice. He just had to survive the swarm of bullets whizzing past his head and make it through miles of vast, frigid countryside first. With every close call he swore under his breath, each one like a spell or irreverent prayer casted to invoke his miraculous getaway. A miracle would do nicely right about now, but he’d settle for some luck as well. Curt drove full-speed into the barbed-wire fence surrounding the complex- barely even steering as he kept his body as low as possible to evade getting shot- and successfully broke through, dragging that entire segment of fence along with him until it snapped and flew off to one side.

He heard more engines starting in the distance. It was a stupid idea but he veered away from the only road to take his chances with the brush and jagged rocks. Driving on a clear path would only make him easier to shoot at. The gunfire and shouting grew distant; and it was stupid but he actually started to relax somewhat, feeling the adrenaline still hammering at his heart but the tension dissolving, slowly. Just him and miles upon miles upon miles of nothing. And a corpse. And Russian operatives on his tail who may or may not catch up to him, given that they’d know better than him how to navigate their home turf. All things considered, this was one of the more favorable outcomes... but not really a _personal best_ for him.

The problem with driving a stolen vehicle aimlessly in unfamiliar territory towards a place you aren’t sure you’ll find while carrying cargo that _will_ cause more trouble instantly if anyone sees it **ISN’T** whatever consequences might arise if any one of these factors were to screw him over. It’s the quiet. The large chunk of time spent driving in silence because you’re listening for the enemy. Reliving the moment on the stairwell in your head again and again now that there’s nothing else to do, unable to distance yourself from it just yet because, well, shit, Curt could easily glance over his shoulder to see proof of the aftermath. So when his adrenaline finally crashed an hour into the drive, all the emotions he’d crammed into the garbage can in his brain poured out at once, and for however long that lasted he at least had the sound of his own anguish to fill the nothingness. But anguish turned into misery turned into heartache turned into _emptiness_ , and he still had miles more to go.

Eventually Curt found a hill sizable enough to hide his vehicle from detection on the horizon- in the direction that the Russians would probably be coming from, anyway, _if_ they came. He parked it and took a walk around the area, certainly to scout for potential trouble but also... to find a spot. For Owen. He’d never be able to take him back home via plane or train, and the body wouldn’t last the journey if they traveled by any slower method. It had to be here. And it wasn’t too bad of a spot, as far as spots go: the slightly concave part of the hill faced the sunset, looking towards England. It was secluded, breezy, strewn with plants that would maybe bloom for him in the spring, _and_ if the hill ever crumbled to stony bits on top of his grave then it would be like getting buried twice, for extra protection. Sure.

The vehicle didn’t come with any tools of use for this particular endeavor, but Curt found thick worker’s gloves in the toolbox and used Owen’s knives to carve into the ground once he cleared enough rocks out of the way to allow him access to the soil. It didn’t concern him that the knives were gonna be dull as hell after this; besides, it was only right to bury those with Owen, after he finished utterly ruining them. He worked for hours, perhaps as many or more hours as he had driven, carving and scooping out earth and honestly grateful to have something to do again for the time being. Then the sun began its descent into the other hemisphere, darkening the sky until he couldn’t safely dig anymore. He crawled out, rolled onto his back, caught his breath; tossed the knives into the pit. His craftsmanship wasn’t the finest but the hole seemed deep enough and that was the important part.

As he approached the back seat of the vehicle, the urge to have something of Owen’s to keep as a memento hit him so unexpectedly and intensely, and only then did he come to the realization that he never recovered Owen’s gun after... after shooting him. _Killing him._ It wouldn’t do Curt any good to act coy about what happened today. But yes: he hadn’t even bothered to search for Owen’s weapon back at the facility and now he was mentally kicking himself. He **needed** something tangible of Owen’s. He’d been left with nothing the first time, nothing but phantoms lurking in the back of his thoughts and the heavy guilt that comes with leaving someone you care about behind to either be captured or die. In all those nights when Curt woke up in a sweat, shocked by the suddenness of Owen’s absence, he would clutch the neck of a bottle like there was a remnant of Owen miraculously trapped within. He would guzzle down the contents, flooding the blood in his veins with a poisonous imitation of Owen’s companionship. Drinking to remember. Drinking to forget. The line between the two was nonexistent.

Curt chose to keep Owen’s holster harness in lieu of the gun. It was still something he could keep on his person, and who knows, it would probably end up being _more_ useful because (if that obnoxious third wheel at the casino had taught him anything) keeping his piece tucked into the back of his pants didn’t so much prove to be the safest or most inconspicuous method for concealed carry. He took the time to put it on, adjust the straps, and secure his gun in the holster even though doing so cost him a significant portion of sunset. There wasn’t going to be any chance to do this better, to honor Owen properly. Hell, Owen was a traitor to his country; British soil would’ve spit him back out anyway. Curt might be one of the few people- or maybe the last person- who still considered Owen to be deserving of a good sendoff, and it came from more than just a place of guilt: the two of them together used to be everything they needed in this world. It used to _be_ their world. And even though Owen went off to create his ‘new world’ or whatever, here they were, colliding together again one final time.

In the grayed, dim final-breath of daylight, Curt lowered Owen into his grave, which was a few inches too short and a few inches too deep to do it with complete dignity- meaning that after a point he had to just drop him unceremoniously the rest of the way in. And he didn’t stop there: he got right to work kicking the dirt back in, figuring it would be an easy task to get done while his eyesight adjusted to the moonlight. He was sort of glad to be burying Owen at night, to be honest, even if it made him feel that much more like a criminal burying his crime (and wasn’t that essentially the truth of the matter?). At least this way he wouldn’t be able to clearly recall this image of Owen in his nightmares; no, instead he could leave it up to his imagination to paint the horrific picture. He already regretted speculating about it at all.

No magical feeling of closure or fulfillment washed over him the moment he finished tamping the brittle soil flat. No voice that sounded too much like Owen in the back of his mind sought to assuage the uncertainties and unresolved issues that would linger maybe forever. Curt ought to be feeling _a lot_ of things right about now, but it was kind of hard to feel anything except exhausted. He’d sort of already felt it all earlier, or so he thought.

He sat on a nearby boulder next to Owen’s grave and stared at it with his head dipped low, absentmindedly pulling off his gloves. Subsequently realizing how damn cold it was getting. He only made a half-assed attempt to insulate a bit from the stinging chill, shoving his hands under his arms and crossing his legs uncomfortably. But he couldn’t get up until he figured out what he wanted to say. Funny how he’d had all this time to think about it but he hadn’t wanted to confront those thoughts yet. Well, he no longer had the luxury of ‘not yet’ and still he choked on the words as he tried to speak. Too much to say. Too many frogs in his throat. 

Calm down. Breathe in, hold, breathe out. And think. What did he want Owen to know? What would Owen have wanted to hear? Probably nothing, if he’s being honest- or probably the sound of _Curt’s_ skull cracking itself open on the concrete. No, focus! What did he need Owen to know?

“I-“ he started.

Good start. He swallowed, his mouth dry and uncooperative. Unable to unravel what he _wanted_ to say, he tried again with what he _should_ say.

“I’m sorry, my old friend. My partner. And, uh, my... my _partner._

...I’m so sorry.”

He looked away for a moment, forced some more freezing air into his lungs.

“I missed you every day, you know that? All this time. I didn’t just stop; I still- _loved_ you. So is that why...”

Deep breath. A morbid, breathy chuckle. His empty stomach twisted and churned.

“...Is that why you _let me_ kill you? What, you thought you could- _break_ me one last time? Make me see the world like you do? ...did? Well- Well it didn’t work. As a matter of fact, I’m more determined than ever to find the bastard that _brainwashed_ you and put an end to all this Chimera business, so, sorry.”

Curt wasn’t sorry for refusing to change his opinion about the super-surveillance-whatever. He wasn’t sorry for wanting to avenge his preferred memory of Owen, to find a little atonement for himself and closure for their story. He wasn’t even sorry that doing so meant he would continue to place himself at odds with Owen in spirit. That rivalrous spark had always featured prominently in their relationship. But he did have a lot more to be sorry for, mainly for the part he played in the creation of a monster. These particular apologies weren’t for any one thing but rather a multitude of things he didn’t know how to articulate any better. It encompassed everything. It fixed nothing.

“And, if it means anything at all, at this point, I wish I could’ve done more. To- _help_ you, _find_ you, I don’t know. I just... wish that I had done more. But you’re right about one thing: I have to move on.”

He stood up with an air of self-assurance that thus far he’d merely been trying to emulate from his glory days, only this time he could feel it in earnest. It was familiar, but different. A good ‘different’. Like he just might be able to believe that the words coming out of his mouth were his own. 

“I’m sure you’re sick of hearing me talk, anyway, so, uh... Goodbye, Owen. And goodnight.”

The vehicle had no roof to it and as such provided minimal cover from the overnight freeze. No luck finding any blankets or even a damn newspaper in the trunk. Curt hunkered down in the driver’s seat (in case he suddenly needed to make a quick getaway, but also because he vehemently refused to lay where Owen had been not an hour or two ago) and held tightly onto his leather jacket, covering as much of his exposed skin as he could- his face and arms, primarily. His chances of making it back to friendly territory would plummet if he allowed frostbite to get the better of him. He forced himself to ignore Owen’s bloodstains spotting the lining of the jacket. Convinced himself that the faint smell of it was from the rust of that old building. How he managed to fall asleep in those conditions was anyone’s guess, but he did slip into something like unconsciousness for a time. The absolute exhaustion depleting him body, mind, and soul was a big help.

He dreamt about Owen. Of course he did. Even if he _thought_ he was done processing the past 24 hours, his brain still had to compartmentalize the memory and internally make sense of it all, which involved rehashing it in a series of disjointed dreams that made no sense to him whatsoever. But they were much more tame than he might’ve expected: they weren’t nightmares, they were honestly just really disorienting dreams, half brought-on by the pervasive temperatures and half by his own dogged resolution to keep these thoughts and feelings under lock and key normally. You can’t do that when you’re asleep. That was kind of the crux of his whole problem before.

_Owen stands above him, looming proudly and deity-like. His gun gleams under an undeterminable source of light, blinding Curt by filling his vision with blotches of dark red to the point where he can no longer recognize Owen’s face. He hears Owen speaking softly to him, but the words aren’t words. The weapon lowers slightly, out of the light’s reach, but nothing fades into focus._

_Owen stands above him, hunched, feral and so angry. He has every right to be. He postures as fierce as a lion, holds his ground as stubborn as a goat, lashes out as deadly as a snake, and threatens to fly higher than Curt can ever reach. Curt doesn’t want to admit how small he feels in Owen’s shadow. He never meant to knock him down to Earth. Not the first time._

_Owen stands above him. He is dead. He moves and breathes and talks as though he is alive, but there is a void inside of him that Curt can’t tear his eyes away from. It looks (in no uncertain terms) like the bottom of a shadowy stairwell interminably rushing up to meet him, the wind whipping at his ears screaming for release. Curt raises his gun and obliges. Owen stands above him, shakes his head patronizingly as everything they ever were together comes pouring out of his wound. His empty laugh freezes Curt’s veins._

_Owen stands above him asking him not to do it, begging him to do it, goading him to do it, gloating about how he **wouldn’t** do it, demanding him to **do** **it** and to **stop it** simultaneously. Curt can’t. He must. He will. He did._

_Owen is bleeding out on the stairwell but he is still, always, **always** above him, looming larger than he really was as Curt finds himself slipping into his own downfall. Inexplicably, Tatiana is there. She hadn’t been there- as in, been **there** \- but she’s here now; with a great deal of effort, she drags him back onto solid ground. She sees Owen, and knows what Curt did. Curt knows that she knows. And she knows that Curt knows that even though she knows about them to a certain extent, she can’t understand. Which is fine. Just the thought of her being there, when she wasn’t, is fine enough._

_Owen stands above him and Tatiana stands ready to break Curt’s fall._

Opening his eyes to sunlight, stiff joints and complaining muscles, Curt gradually returned to awareness same as his bones gradually drank in the warmth. The fact that he could feel twinges of pain throughout his body was a good sign, and he focused on that as he carefully unfolded himself with only a minor grumbling fit. He awoke to quiet, under no immediate danger, and with all his vital parts still functioning, but most importantly he awoke _not_ thoroughly devastated and paralyzed by his mistakes and _without_ the revolting aftertaste of a full night of drinking on his tongue. No, this revolting aftertaste was plain old dehydration. Upon stumbling out of the vehicle and properly zipping up his jacket, he reached for his flask on instinct. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d filled it, or with what, but it’s still half full judging by the sloshing and right now anything will do. He recoiled for all of two seconds before- was that- was that _water?_ He had some common sense left in him, after all. There was nothing quite like stale, ice cold water to hydrate your ice cold organs on an ice cold morning- but hey, he was alive and he intended to _stay_ alive for the time being. Shame he couldn’t do anything for his hunger, though... then again, he supposed he could just dig Owen back up.

Jokes. Another good sign, maybe. Depending.

He took another walk now that he had full light, hiking as far as he dared to go in order to scope the horizon while still keeping his getaway car in his range of visibility. It cost more time than he would’ve liked as a guy who was probably still being hunted, but an hour or two later he finally spotted buildings, as well as what appeared to be a road (maybe even the same road he’d abandoned earlier) leading that way. But now another problem posed itself: would the Russians be waiting for him in a town that was in the same direction they’d last seen him heading? Ah, shit, should he abandon the car here, then? It still had some gas left in it and could save him a few hours of energy that he definitely didn’t have in him right now- but the Russians were likely to be _looking_ for it. He couldn’t just roll into town with a military vehicle and expect to go unnoticed. 

Alright, ok, then he wouldn’t. Problem solved. All he had to do was get close enough that he could ditch the car and walk the rest of the way, and after that... He would figure it out. He’d always been a ‘one step at a time’ kind of thinker, not really interested in strategy or the bigger picture. Something like Chimera was so much larger than his typical scope; he had no idea where he was even going to start with that. But that didn’t matter because that was a problem for Future Curt to handle- and he knew he wouldn’t have to handle it alone, either. Here and now, Current Curt huffed a labored sigh into the wind and began the trek back to the car.

He had no more words to leave behind at Owen’s resting place, having said his goodbyes already. A few times, at this point. He was so tired of goodbyes now. Still, as he drove away he couldn’t stop himself from glancing back at the mound slowly fading into the distance in his sideview mirrors until it became indistinguishable from the rock around it, and he continued to travel onward and forward, as all things must.

He had things to do.

He had a person to be.

And he had places to go, all of which were onward and forward.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading
> 
> you can find me on tumblr at thisisasupergoodidea.tumblr.com
> 
> ===
> 
> i know there must be dozens of fics that are much like this one on ao3 by now (and ive read quite a few myself) but i, too, write fanfic to cope... so here is the fruit of my feelings about it that i have finally finished after so long and i’m excited to share


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